Latest Blog Posts - Padre's Ponderings

I am interested in marriage. Not only have I been married for more than 41 years I have been a marriage celebrant for about 30 years and probably officiated at more than a hundred marriages! An article I read this week quoted the Australian Bureau of...

One of the things I was looking forward to when I became “semi-retired” was expanding my role as a grandparent. Over the last couple of weeks of my annual leave the reality of that decision has taken on a whole new dimension. My wife and I though...

What does it take to break your heart? What level of suffering or trauma do you need to see or experience before you have an emotional response? As I reflect on and talk about my “holiday” in Nepal, several times I have been surprised that I had...

As Easter slides into the past, with the chocolate eggs and bunnies are all eaten, the rest of the long weekend quickly forgotten and now we return to “normal” life. The mundane get up, go to work, come home routine that holds no joy, no job sati...

Part of my role is to listen to all the bad things that happen to people. I help them to talk about their dashed hopes and dreams as a result of the breakdown of a significant relationship or experiences on deployment or tension at work. As you could...

Do you ever struggle to get out of bed, drag your feet through the day at work, feeling that you are not achieving anything and suspecting that everyone is against you? When you finally get home you have no energy to give to your family? Then, to top...

No card? Try using balloons instead. What does it mean to think outside the box? In terms of what my boss was asking me to do, it was about coming up with new ideas, and seeking to be a bit more creative because the standard approaches were just not...

Recently my young and beautiful wife took me to the theatre for my birthday and we saw the musical Les Miserables. Apart from the fact that it was a great show, what got at me was the unstated question, “can people change?” I will not spoil the p...

Today in my reading of the Bible I was forced to do a reality check, when I read: “If you keep your mouth shut, you will stay out of trouble” (Proverbs 21:23). Sometimes, it is the simple things that make the biggest impact! But the more I though...

Tynecot Cemetery Having visited Ypres and many other places on the Western Front, it is hard to imagine the hundreds of thousands that died in what today is rich, green farmland. One of the original observers who saw a very different picture was McCr...